Friday, July 12, 2013

Happy Friday all! We made it again! I hope you have some great reading on tap for the weekend. I'm embroiled in a great Swedish crime novel. August looks like it's going to have some real winners in the crime fiction book release category! I'm already thinking I'm going to have a hard time making my Nerdy Special List pick for August.

I still have a bunch of reviews to catch up on here, so hopefully I'll get several written this weekend, but rest assured, they are coming. Another one to add to the YA list as well. Did you check out my review of GAME yesterday? It's been awhile since I was a YA myself but I tried to think if my former students would have enjoyed the book. I think so...

I'm not going to ramble on anymore, sorry about that. I will share our contest round-up:

Pop Culture Nerd has a nice giveaway of a book and tote going on over at her blog.

Criminal Element is giving away the shirt off their back...the bowling shirt that is.

As for me, I have a fun new Five on Friday for you. Pete Larkin narrates Duane Swierczynski's Charlie Hardie trilogy. I honestly don't think anyone could have done a better job bringing Hardie to life, as soon as I heard it I thought, "this IS Charlie Hardie." I won't give you too much more background on Pete because I have a more comprehensive interview to share with you next week, as well as my review of the final audiobook of the trilogy, but today, it is my great pleasure to welcome Pete Larkin to the Five on Friday hot seat.

If I could tell my 16-year old self anything, it would be not to worry
too much about things, don't be afraid to take chances, and, above all,
don't sweat the small stuff. I would tell my younger self to venture large.
If you want to be an actor, TRY IT. The worst thing is that you might
fail. If you want to be a politician, give it a shot. The bottom line is that
SOMEONE has to do those things; it might as well be you.

The best gift I ever received was, hands-down, the arrival of my daughter.
She'll be 23 years old soon, and I simply cannot conceive of life without
her. Everyone tells you how wonderful children are, etc. But NO ONE
tells you how funny they are. You laugh all the time. She is the joy of
my life.

One thing I have no tolerance for is a lack of empathy, the complete
IN-ability to put yourself in someone else's shoes. If we, as a people,
could get better at that, it would cure a whole host of ills. Racism and
poverty would be eradicated, if ONLY we could imagine ourselves living
OTHER lives.

A skill I've always wanted to have, but don't...
I've always wanted to be able to play baseball better than I can, which
can only be described as OK. This kind of syncs up with Question #1,
about taking chances, because, if I had it to do over again, I'd work harder
at baseball, practice all the time, and take a REAL shot at it.
Oh, well...suppose I DID have a baseball career. I'm old enough now, that I
would be finished with my career, and I wouldn't have played during the
"big money" era. You just can't win.

Bucket List Question
I guess one thing I've always wanted to do (and STILL want
to do), is sell my house, buy an RV, and go touring around the
US, Canada and South America for a good long while, maybe
5 years. This has been a desire of mine for as long as I can
remember. It seems that, whenever I've been on vacation, I
always "just miss" something. The locals would say, "Oh, what
a shame you couldn't be here next week. That's when we do
the annual...What a shame you JUST missed it." Traveling in an
RV, with total freedom to come and go would cure that.

You know Pete hit a big chord with me on the lack of empathy response! Love it. However, I'll leave the traveling around in an RV to him. ;-)

Many thanks to Pete for making time to play in the sandbox with us today. I'm always so honored by the wonderful and thoughtful...sometimes funny...often revealing responses we get for Five on Friday. Thanks for sharing a little part of you today, Pete!

And thanks to everyone for stopping by. Be sure to stop back next week for an interview with Pete Larkin as well as more reviews and ALWAYS book fun! Happy Reading, friends!

Affiliates

Shaw Academy

Jen's Book Thoughts (a.k.a. Jen Forbus) is a participant in the Amazon Services LLC Associates Program, an affiliate advertising program designed to provide a means for sites to earn advertising fees by advertising and linking to Amazon.com.

Amazon, the Amazon logo, AmazonSupply, and the AmazonSupply logo are trademarks of Amazon.com, Inc. or its affiliates.